Expressing Selves: A Comparative Study of the Memoirs of Tāj al-Salṭana and Bībī Maryam Bakhtiyārī

Abstract

Born and raised in Nāṣirī Qajar Iran, both Sardār (commander) Maryam Bakhtiyārī (1874–1937), daughter of Ḥusayn Qulī Khan, the Īlkhānī (chief of the tribes) of the Bakhtiyārīs, an influential nomadic tribe, and Zahrā Khānum Tāj al-Salṭana (1884–1936), daughter of Nāṣir al-Dīn Shah, wrote memoirs. Both of these texts are incomplete, and only one - Tāj’s autobiography - has been translated into English. The two memoirs present the female narrative of Iranian society through two different lenses: from inside the royal harem and from the landscape of nomadic life. This article argues that despite their different lifestyles, both women were the subject of Foucault’s “docile body,” the “body as object and target of power,” which “may be subjected, used, transformed, and improved”1 in the misogynic institutions that controlled and employed them. As Saud Joseph argues, a “predominant patriarchal family system”2 designated guardians for these women through the male relatives. This system also allowed men to act with impunity so long as they fulfilled their procreation duty inside their family institution. Women, on the other hand, were the instruments of reproduction. This article also provides an overview of the ways these women reacted to the conditions constraining them. Their reactions distinguish Tāj’s and Maryam’s lives as role models who went beyond the social framework and pushed the boundaries.